


Just a quick look

by Kore88



Category: Biggest Gaudiest Patronuses (Tumblr), The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-16 10:22:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28954917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kore88/pseuds/Kore88
Summary: Statement of a Tumblr user, from the domain of Biggest-Gaudiest-Patronuses. Taken in situ by The Achivisit
Comments: 42
Kudos: 331





	Just a quick look

**Author's Note:**

> Based on this Tumblr post: https://kore888.tumblr.com/post/641134077307731968/biggest-gaudiest-patronuses-cor-are-they-stars

You scroll through Tumblr on your phone, idly moving from post, to post, to post. You tell yourself you will just look for five more minutes. You know you have something important to do today, that you haven’t even begun to prepare for. You can’t quite seem to recall what it is though. Every time you try to focus on it the details get kind of hazy. Was it something you had to do for work? Was that it? You do have a job, don’t you?  
“Of course I do," you think to yourself, "I’m a ...”

A post on your feed catches your eye. It’s explaining that Kiwifruit are the eggs of Kiwi birds. That’s not right is it? You don’t think so. Surely not. You’ve eaten Kiwis, there’s no way that was an egg. The post makes so much sense though, and there’s pictures and so much detail. That’s not how science works, you know this, you studied it at uh. You pause trying to recall, at um, some point or other. That’s it, you are just going to google it, just to be sure.

You are about to swap apps, to pull up your web browser and open a new tab to search for the answer, when the next post down catches your eye. It's the image of what the inside of a bird looks like. Oh god why does its spine bend that way, surely nothing's spine should bend that way.

You need to look at something else to get that image from your mind. The next post is a video, it’s the challenge where people hide behind a blanket then jump behind a wall or something and their pets think they disappear. You’ve seen it before but why not. It was entertaining enough. It’s longer than you remember though, much longer. You’ re sure you found it funny before but now all the animals just seem sad.

The video ends, and with a sudden flash of resolve you press the button on your phone, turning the screen dark. Right, that's it. You have something important to do today and you’ve been scrolling for what must have been hours. As soon as you think that you realise how hungry you are. You’ve been feeling it for some time, but you’ve not really been aware of it until now. When was the last time you ate? You try to think but you can’t quite remember. Is it near a mealtime, you wonder. Maybe lunchtime? No it can’t be, you must have missed that. But maybe it’s not so late that it won’t matter if you eat now, or maybe it will and you should just wait. So you don’t spoil your appetite before dinner.

You open your phone just to check the time, but there’s a notification. Maybe someone reblogged your addition to that post with all those notes. You know you said something witty that would make a memorable contribution. You open the app greedily. The promise of validation a mere click away. The notification isn’t new. It isn’t even from today. You know this by the date which sits mockingly above the notification. You aren’t quite sure what today's date is, but you know that isn’t it.

You know you’ve read that notification before, many times. One of your mutuals reblogging a post, you reblogged from somebody else. You’ve lost count of how many times you’ve opened your notifications to see the same one there, highlighted as if unread. You swipe back to your main feed in disappointment.

There’s a new post. You chuckle.  
“Yeah it really did sound like the singer had a personal grudge against the Grinch,” you think to yourself.  
You scroll down further though the post. Gaud has written a fic about it. You follow the link to read feeling a mixture of amusement and horrified fascination. It opens in your web browser, opening a new tab. You don’t see the number but you know it’s somewhere in the triple digits.

The fic is annoyingly good.  
“How can it be this good?” you wonder, as you read through chapter after chapter. Each one just a little bit longer than the one before. You’re on chapter 18 and they haven’t even kissed yet. _Slow Burn_ the tags say. You keep reading, you’re eyes are starting to get tired but you need to know what happens. You go to click on the next chapter button but it’s not there. Is the fic still in progress? You scroll back up to the tags. Chapter 99/8762.

You scroll down to the comments. The perfect thing to say already in your head, but you want to see what a few other people have said first. Someone has already made the point you wanted too. The author has responded underneath.  
“Yes I loved that detail too, your comment meant so much to me!”  
That could have been you, if only you hadn’t been so slow. You want to leave a comment too, but there’s already so many and you can’t think of something else to say. You start typing in the comment box, starting sentences over and over and then frantically deleting them each time

“I loved the bit where you ...”  
“I couldn’t believe it when ...”  
“I wish I could write like ...”  
“Please notice me too, I ...”

You give up on writing a comment for now, maybe you’ll be able to think of something good to say later.

You scroll back up to the button with the image of a heart. You’re sure that you remember it being a cute symbolic heart before. Not a realistic depiction like it is now, complete with dripping blood. You click it anyway.

“You’ve already left Kudo’s here”

You go back to Tumblr. The post at the top now, is a series of pictures of fish. You’ve never really liked fish. You keep scrolling anyway. The pictures get worse. It has so many teeth, why does a fish need so many teeth?

You close your eyes, but the image is already imprinted in your brain. You take a minute breathing slowly, you should think of something else. You remember suddenly. You have something important to do today, and you haven’t even eaten yet. You’ve wasted hours doing nothing on your phone again. Why do you do this to yourself? You throw your phone against the wall in frustration.

It impacts with a horrifying crunch. You run over in desperation, what have you done. You’ve broken it. You pick through the shattered pieces, barely noticing as the sharp edges of the screen cut your fingers. What are you going to do now? How will you read the next chapter of the fic? What if someone with enough followers finally reblogged your post? Now you will never know if kiwi fruit really are eggs.

There’s a sound from your front door. Your brain wants to call it a knock but that’s not quite right. You recall a toy you used to have, one of those sticky, slimy hand things. You slap it against a surface as hard as you can, to see how long it will stick before it falls to the floor and gathers dust. The noise from your front door was like one of those being slapped against it, only much, much larger.

The knocking comes again.  
“That’s it!” you think to yourself, “I had a guest coming today.”  
That must be the important thing. But you haven’t tidied. You look in desperation at the mess all around you. You kept meaning to clean up of course but you never quite got round to it. What are they going to think of you?

The knock comes again. You stand up, and as you do you remember how hungry you are. You still haven’t eaten. Will your guest expect dinner? Or are they expecting you to have already eaten? To be a capable adult who will have actually fed themselves. Do you even have food to offer them?

The knock comes again. You open the door. What’s on the other side is just a large, ever-moving, pink blob. You stare at it in confusion. It shouldn’t exist. A friend was meant to be visiting, weren’t they? Not whatever this thing is. Finally you realise it has a face. It's twisted and unpleasant somehow but you can’t break eye contact. What a rude thought you were just having about your friend. Why would you have even thought that Gaudy wasn’t your friend?

You blink and now the creature in front of you is tall and thin. More humanoid. Somehow that makes it worse. It smiles. You recognise it instantly. It’s Gaud, you follow them on Tumblr. They’re basically an internet celebrity and here they are in front of you. You should take a picture, you realise. Pics or it didn’t happen.

“I’ll just go get my pho...” you break off. Tears spring to your eyes as you remember the bloody fragments littering your carpet.

“dO yOU wAnt mE To fOlLOw yOu?” Gaud asks.

YES!! Of course you want that. Gaud’s blog is huge, and their number of followers immense. To have them following you. You stammer an affirmative. They are taller than your door. But they ooze themselves through somehow. They follow you through your living space. Sometimes a blob, sometimes person shaped. Always pink and translucent. Coating everything around them in a thin layer of pink slime.

It’s odd now that you think about. Everything around you already had a thin dried pink layer of something coating it. As if the slime from Gaud had, had time to dry. But that’s impossible. They’ve never been here before. You would have remembered that.

You reach the wreck of your phone and look down at it sadly. Gaud doesn’t stop though. As they bloop their way over it there’s a horrible gurgling sound, like when you pour rancid fat down the sink. The pieces get absorbed into Gaud somehow, you can see them there floating.

“I hAvE a GifT For yOu!” Gaud reaches out a pink, gooey hand and in it is a brand new phone. It’s the same make as the one you had before, but it’s the newer model. You’re sure you’ve heard such great things about it. Not only that but it’s in on of those shatterproof cases. The ones you’ve seen advertised in videos where horrible accidents happen, and the camera pans away from mangled bodies to show you the perfectly preserved phone.

You take the phone eagerly. Excited to see how much clearer the display is, what new features it has. You worry you might need to charge it, but no. It turns on straight away. The battery symbol flashes on screen briefly, but where the bars would usually be there’s something else instead. Is that the infinity symbol? You can’t be sure as the image flashes away and your home screen lights up in front you.

You barely notice as Gaud melts away slowing through the floor, leaving a wide pink stain on your carpet. Your home screen is already set up just how you like it. All your apps are already loaded as well. You open Tumblr. You’re just going to take a quick look.

After all, you have something important to do today.

**Author's Note:**

> I am bingeing my way through the Magnus archives, currently on season 5. So when I saw this post from Gaud I just had to write a statement for their domain. I would say it's a mix of the Beholding and the Lonely. Based on my own experience and fear of executive dysfunction


End file.
